1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is related to the field of glasses. More specifically, the invention relates to protective eyewear including a visor.
2. Description of Related Art
Eyeglasses and sunglasses are generally known in the art and are commonly used to correct vision problems and to provide protection to the eyes, both from air borne objects, and from harmful electromagnetic radiation. Sunglasses and other eyewear designs which are commonly used to protect the eyes from the sun are often manufactured from plastic materials but are still commonly referred to as glasses. Various eyeglass and sunglass designs and accessories have been developed to provide increased protection to the wearer from the brightness of the sun, such designs and accessories including clip-on eye protectors, gradient lenses and visors, including wrap-around type protective eyewear with visors. However, as will be discussed in more detail below, all of these known sunglass and protective eyewear designs and accessories are subject to various limitations which compromise the protection offered to the wearer, limit their utility, substantially reduce the wearer's visibility and/or diminish their aesthetic appeal.
The general features and design of conventional sunglasses is well known in the art and need not be discussed in detail here. It has been recognized in the art that many wearer's of sunglasses must also use prescription glasses to correct various eye conditions such as near-sightedness, far-sightedness and stigmatism. To provide protection from the brightness of the sun and to eliminate the need for a separate pair of prescription sun glasses which are generally very expensive, auxiliary clip-on eye protectors have been designed in various forms for use in conjunction with the prescription glasses. Such clip-on eye protectors are installed directly on the lenses of the prescription glasses and are illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 3,575,497 to Leblanc and U.S. Pat. No. 3,876,295 to Loughner. The lenses of these clip-on eye protectors may be tinted to provide light protection and may be pivotally moved between an operative position where the lenses cover the lenses of the prescription glasses and an inoperative position out of the line of vision of the wearer. These clip-on protectors are generally provided with a single, uniform tinting and are generally very dark in order to provide adequate protection to the eyes. However, because these clip-on protectors are merely additional lenses in front of the prescription glasses with conventional frame designs, they do not provide any additional protection from the intense light of the sun than do any other conventional sunglasses. More specifically, when conventional sunglasses are worn, there are usually substantial gaps between the wearer's eyes and the dark tinted lenses especially at the side temple region, near the nose support region and near the eye brow region. Because these gaps allow the sun light and air borne objects to enter the eye, conventional sunglasses and glasses utilizing the clip-on protectors do not provide maximum protection to the wearer's eyes thereby compromising the protection to the wearer.
In addition, the very dark tinting has some disadvantages in that wearers have found that the glasses were too dark to wear when the sky is slightly overcast with cloud cover or during dusk when the intensity of the sunlight is reduced. Therefore, in these conditions, the wearer's visibility was through such clip-on protectors is substantially reduced making the use of such protectors not practical under these conditions. In addition, other wearers objected to the very dark tinting even in very bright conditions because it prevented others from being able to make eye contact with the wearer since the wearer's eyes could not be readily seen through the dark tinting. And whereas these clip-on protectors can be placed in their inoperative position, wearers find them to be aesthetically unacceptable in this position and most wearers object to the perceived tacky and gaudy look and the image such look portrays about the wearer.
While these clip-on eye protectors were intended to be only functional in their operative position, the present inventors have found that these clip-on protectors provide some amount of protection to the wearer's eyes when in their inoperative position since intensity of light overhead which reaches the wearer's eyes is reduced by the tinted lenses. However, because the original intended use is as a lens and the clip-on eye protectors include a nose bridge area, the clip-on protectors only provide minimal protection to the wearer's face, especially with respect to the wearer's nose which is known to be more prone to sunburn than any other part of a person's face. And as previously noted, the conventional glasses to which these clip-on eye protectors are attached have been found to be wholly inadequate in providing maximum protection for the wearer's eyes.
Some sunglass designs have attempted to alleviate the disadvantage of dark tinting by providing a gradient lenses in which the tinting is very dark at the top portion of the lens and gradually decrease in darkness toward the bottom portion of the lens. This offered superior protection to the eyes when the wearer's eyes are directed upwardly toward the sun while providing a lighter tinting at the mid portion and the lower portion of the lens such that the sunglasses may still be worn during overcast conditions or during dusk when the intensity of the sun is reduced. Another advantage of the gradient lenses is that they permit eye contact with the wearer through the lighter tinted mid and lower portions of the lens. However, since these gradient lenses are provided on conventional sunglass frames, they also do not provide the maximum protection to the wearer's eyes from the sun light or provide any protection to the wearer's face. In addition, manufacturing of these gradient lenses is very expensive and difficult which makes the use of these gradient lenses impractical and less appealing for many people.
Protective eyewear designs have continued to develop and one design in common use today is the wrap-around design such as those sold under the trademark SOLARSHIELD.RTM. as well as WRAP AROUND SUNGLASSES which are distributed and sold by the assignee of this invention. More recent designs of such wrap-around eyewear is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. D313,236 to Mackay. These wrap-around eyewear designs have been found to offer superior protection to the eyes when compared to conventional eyeglass and sunglass designs since they cover a larger area around the eyes and are generally provided with wide temple portions. More specifically, this additional coverage and the wide temple portions have been found to provide superior physical barrier to objects and projectiles which can enter the eye through the gaps present between the wear's face and conventional sunglasses.
In addition, the wrap-around eyewear of the type described above will often provide additional protection to the wearer by including transparently tinted material capable of filtering out or reducing harmful radiation, such as ultra-violet (UV) radiation while allowing less harmful visible radiation to pass through. Such transparently tinted material may be positioned to be in front of the wearer's eyes and allow an unobstructed forward field of vision while protecting the eyes from harmful radiation. The surrounding portions of the protective eyewear may include similar material or opaque material that completely blocks the entry of light (including harmful radiation) that could otherwise enter the wearer's eyes peripherally or after multiple reflections as occurs when more conventional sunglasses are worn. This shielding effect is accentuated if the temple portions are widened (as compared with conventional eye wear) and are formed of a tinted material capable of reducing the amount of sunlight (especially the harmful radiation) which can enter the eyes through the side gaps of conventional eyeglass designs. Furthermore, these wrap-around eyewear could be designed so that prescription glasses may be worn underneath the wrap-around eyewear thereby allowing the wearer to wear and use the corrective prescription glasses in conjunction with the wrap-around eyewear at a minimal additional cost.
These wrap-around eyewear designs have been especially useful in the medical applications for patients who have undergone cataract surgery and have heightened sensitivity to UV rays and the brightness of the sun. In this regard, the wrap-around protective eyewear have been provided with very dark tinting in order to provide the maximum protection from the brightness of the sun and have been made with materials that block the harmful UV rays. Wearers of such wrap-around protective eyewear have found that the very dark tinting provided ample protection from the sun, especially when the sun is very bright. However, like the wearers of the clip-on eye protectors, these wearers have also found that the wrap-around protective eyewear were too dark when the intensity of the sunlight is reduced and found that the dark tinting substantially reduced the visibility of the wearer in these conditions. In addition, wearers objected to the very dark tinting because it prevented others from being able to make eye contact with the wearer. Furthermore, use of gradient lenses was found to be impractical because of the high manufacturing costs and too expensive for many people. This impracticability is heightened by the fact that many of the wearers of such wrap-around sunglasses purchase them solely for post-eye surgery use, do not want to spend a large amount of money for temporary glasses.
More recently, eyeglasses and sunglasses including an opaque visor on the upper portion of the glass frame has been developed and is illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 5,005,214 to Koethe. These designs include a removably attached visor on the front frame section of an eyeglass that provides additional shading to the wearer's face such as to the wearer's nose which is susceptible to sunburns. As illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 4,976,530 to Mackay et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,390,369 to Tubin and U.S. Pat. No. D294,952 to Wilson, wrap-around eyewear with opaque visors have also been designed and are known in the art. These sunglasses have been designed to combine the benefits of providing additional shading to the wearer's face while also providing better eye protection offered by the wrap-around type eyewear designs as discussed above.
Although the wrap-around eyewear designs which include an opaque visor such as those disclosed in the above noted Mackay and Tubin references provide most of the benefits of the wrap-around design discussed previously and have also been found to provide additional shading to the wearer's face, deficiencies have also been found in these designs as well. For instance, it has been found that these designs obstruct the wearer's field of vision at certain angles. As an example, these opaque visor designs prevent the wearer from seeing objects which are somewhat overhead such as road signs and traffic lights at an intersection. Correspondingly, the utility of these sunglass designs with visors is greatly diminished since they cannot be safely used while driving a motor vehicle or in other situations which require unobstructed field of vision of the wearer. In addition, many wearers found that these wrap-around eyewear with opaque visors induces an "enclosed" or "boxed-in" feeling which is caused by the opaque visor limiting the wearer's field of vision. When these limitations are combined with the disadvantages of the previously discussed wrap-around eyewear designs of the prior art such as the very dark tinting and reduced aesthetic appeal, the utility and appeal of such eyewear is greatly diminished.
Therefore, there exists an unfulfilled need for a protective eyewear design that will provide maximum protection to the wearer from the brightness of the sun and the harmful UV rays and maximize the utility of the protective eyewear, while at the same time, minimizing undesirable obstruction of the wearer's field of vision and maximizing the appeal of the protective eyewear at a minimal cost to the wearer.